R. T. (ca. 1873-1919)
by Raphael Rubinstein
Remembering a singer in
Aleppo, his improvised
pizmonim, his poor voice,
his blindness, his stock of
Arab melodies
elided in an instant to
lines of freshly sung Hebrew poetry.
Transmission of music
across oceans and
borders and back
ought to
unite voices,
songs stowing away like pollen,
honey melting in tea.
The subject of this poem is Raphael Taboush, a rabbi in Aleppo, Syria, who was celebrated for his pizmonim, musical compositions that set Hebrew texts to secular, often Arabic, melodies. Taboush, who went blind at an early age, was also renowned as a musical healer and teacher; his former students carried his music throughout the Syrian Jewish diaspora.
Raphael Rubinstein in a New York based art critic and poet. In 2013, The Song Cave published his The Cry of Unbalance, a chapbook with drawings by Trevor Winkfield.
